Page:A History of Art in Ancient Egypt Vol 2.djvu/119

 The Egyptian Orders. 97 Beni-Hassan ; he accordingly proposed to call their columns proto-donc. Here we shall not attempt to discuss Champollion's theor}'. It would be impossible to do so with advantage without having previously studied the doric column itself, and pointed out how little these resemblances amount to. The doric column had no base ; the diminution of its diameter was much more rapid ; its capital, which comprised an echinus as well as an abacus, was very different in importance from the little tablet which we find at Beni- Hassan. The general proportions of the Greek and Eg}ptian orders are, however, almost identical ; the shafts are fluted in each instance, and they both have the same air of simplicity and imposing gravity. But it is futile to insist upon any such comparison. The polygonal column had long been disused when the Greeks first penetrated into the Nile valley and had an opportunity of imitating the works of the Egyptians. It was in use in the time of the Middle Empire, during the eleventh and twelfth dynasties. The earlier princes of the Second Theban Empire introduced it into their stone buildings, but there are no examples which we can affirm to be later than the eighteenth dynasty. The Rameses and their successors preferred forms less bold and severe ; their columns were true columns with swelling entasis and rich and varied capitals. It is no doubt true that towards the seventh century the Greeks could find the polygonal column which we have described in many an ancient monument. But those early visitors were not archseologists. Astonished and dazzled by the pompous buildings of a Psemethek or an Amasis, they were not likely to waste their attention upon an abandoned and obsolete type. Their admiration would be reserved for the great edifices of the nineteenth and later dynasties, for such creations as Medinet-Abou, the Ramesseum, and the Great Hall at Karnak ; creations which had their equals in those cities of the Delta which were visited by Herodotus and Hecataeus. If Greek art had borrowed from the Egypt of that day it would have transferred to its own home not the simple lines of the porticos at Beni-Hassan, but something ornate and complex, like the order of the small temple of Nectanebo at Philae. These few words had to be given, in passing, to an hypothesis which has found much favour since the days of Champollion, but VOL. II. o